Today, many entities create and/or manage complex data centers capable of storing, accessing, and processing hundreds of terabytes of data (e.g., text, image, and video data). These data center networks may be vast and complex, incorporating thousands of switches, routers, network-enabled devices, and so forth. Evaluating a topology (e.g., an arrangement of various links, nodes, and/or devices within a data center network) for such a data center network can be extremely difficult, complicated, and time consuming.
Traditional network simulation systems may aid in evaluation of small-scale networks. However, conventional simulation strategies employed by such systems are unable to effectively simulate the large scale of data center networks. For example, some traditional network simulation systems are capable of modeling and/or simulating relatively small networks at the event level and/or packet level. However, such traditional network simulation systems do not scale to the extent necessary to reasonably simulate data center networks that may include hundreds or thousands of network traffic routing devices and/or end-point devices.
Other conventional network simulation approaches may apply varying levels of abstraction to simulate certain types of networks, such as software-defined networking (SDN) controlled and/or traffic engineered networks. However, such approaches do not translate to internet protocol (IP) based data center networks that are predominantly based on hop-by-hop and equal-cost multi-path (ECMP) routing. IP hop-by-hop routing may be limited within modern data center networks to shortest-path-first (SPF) routing algorithms, even though SPF routing may be the least path-diverse approach.
Furthermore, conventional network simulation platforms are focused on network traffic and capacity simulation rather than modeling and/or evaluating attributes of the underlying network topology. The instant disclosure, therefore, identifies and addresses a need for improved systems and methods for simulating data center network topologies.